[EAS] Best and Worst of New CAP EAS Rules

[Sean Donelan]

On Tue, 17 Jan 2012, Gary Timm wrote:
> To remove any doubts on the FCC banning TTS at the EAS CAP 
> Encoder/Decoder, read the actual 11.56 (a) (2) rule adopted on Page 113. 
> This clearly states that ECIG guidance on employing TTS at the end 
> device "shall not be followed".  See my www.awareforum.org post for the 
> entire quote.

What is the objective of distributing information using CAP instead of the 
AP/Reuters/etc?  Without clear documentation and agreement of the policy 
objectives between both the originators and distributors of the 
information, its very difficult to figure out if particular technical 
decisions meet those objectives.

It seems like if you receive emergency information off the CAPwire, you 
are not allowed to have an human or automated announcer read it on the 
air because the announcer might mispronounce some words?

On the other hand, you can ignore the CAP device for all state/local 
messages. Wait for the same story from the AP newswire instead.  Then you 
can have an intern rip & read the AP story containing the same 
information on the air, or a completely automated station could have a 
text to speech automaton read the story from the AP newswire instead of 
CAPwire.

CAP is just a tool.  But I'm not sure if it is supposed to be a hammer, a 
screwdriver, a saw, or some other kind of tool.